Normally issued in green, a yellow variety of this stamp it was found in 1885 by Georg Wilhelm Backman on a letter during a visit to his grandmother. There is only one specimen known of this variety. It was printed with the wrong color meant for the 8 sk! In 1886 a stamp dealer bought the stamp for 7 swedish krones. Ferrary, a well-known stampcollector, bought the stamp in 1894. Lately, in 1996 the stamp was sold for 2.5 million Swiss Franken (= $us 2.27 million). More information about the history of this stamp can be found on the site www.treskillingyellow.com. I have seen many forgeries of this stamp, but since only one specimen is known, they can easily be recognised (note that even the cancellation has been copied very carefully on the above forgeries).

Cancels:

(Typical cancels, reduced sizes)

The first cancel is the most common cancel; a townname in a single circle with the date in the center. The second rectangular cancel is much rare and was frequently used on letters before stamps were introduced in Sweden. But it also continued to be used in many towns during the first years after stamps were introduced, but were subsequently replaced by round cancels (information and images obtained thanks to Lasse Hult).

Reprints:

Official reprints were made from the 'Skilling' values in 1868, 1871 and 1885, example:

These reprints are very difficult to distinguish from the genuine stamps. Some of them have perforation 13 instead of 14.

Forgeries:

Sperati forgeries (I have no further information concerning these forgeries):

Other forgery:

The letters are different in the above forgery.

I think the next stamps are forgeries made by Peter Winter in the 1980's:

(Peter Winter forgeries)

(Winter forgery of the misprint 3 sk yellow)

Peter Winter offered forgeries of the following values: 3 sk green, 4 sk blue, 6 sk grey-brown, 6 sk grey, 8 sk yellow and 24 sk red. Of course, he also made a forgery of the misprint 3 sk yellow, even a 3 sk yellow and 8 sk yellow printed together. As with all his forgeries, they have a very modern appearance, the paper is very white. I have also seen these Peter Winter forgeries with cancels; for example: 'STOCKHOLM 18/5 18 56' on the 3 sk, 'STOCKHOLM 11 7 18 57' on the 6 sk and 24 sk, or a three ring cancel with '1' in the center on the 8 sk value.

Some modern computer generated forgeries were made by the so-called Hialeah forger. These forgeries are very badly executed, examples:

1872 Value, inscription 'SVERIGE FRIMARKE', with or without posthorn in blue on backside of the stamp

In 1886 a blue posthorn was applied on the backside of certain values of these stamps (4 o, 5 o, 20 o, 30 o and 50 o). In 1887 a 2 o and in 1888 a 6 o was issued with the same posthorn. The value 2 o only exists with posthorn on the back